It seems to me that the picture of the soul suggested by D's treatment of wanting is remarkably tranquil and, one might almost say, com-puterised. It is a picture of an ideally decorous board meeting, at which the various heads of sections advance, from the stand-point of their particular provinces, the case for or against some proposed course of action. In the end the chairman passes judgement, effective for action; normally judiciously, though sometimes he is for one reason or another over-impressed with the presentations made by some particular member: My soul doesn't seem to me, a lot of the time, to be like that at all. It is more like a particularly unpleasant department meeting, in which some members shout, won't listen, and suborn other members to lie on their behalf; while the chair-man, who is often himself under suspicion of cheating, endeavours to impose some kind of order; frequently to no eflect, since some times the meeting breaks up in disorder, sometimes, though it appears to end comfortably; in reality all sorts of enduring lesions are set up, and sometimes, whatever the outcome of the meeting, individual members go off and do things unilaterally.
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